


I Have Come to Hate Thursday Nights

by pir8fancier



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-09
Updated: 2013-10-09
Packaged: 2017-12-28 22:22:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/997612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pir8fancier/pseuds/pir8fancier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to <i>Eye of the Beholder</i>. Harry can't choose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Have Come to Hate Thursday Nights

**Author's Note:**

> Written for vaysh11's birthday.

I have come to truly hate Thursday nights. It’s marriage counseling night. I find it terribly ironic that someone like me—who has been justifiably called neurotic, sociopathic, deviant, narcissistic, and a general public nuisance who should be hung by his thumbs until his eyeballs bleed out by a good hunk of the wizarding world—is _not_ the person who is subjecting himself to weekly therapy sessions in the hopes of ending his marriage. Or saving his marriage. It’s unclear exactly what these sessions are trying to accomplish. By this point. At least I’m not clear. I’m trying not to get my knickers in a twist about it, but I’m a knickers-in-a-fucking-twist sort of fellow. At the best of times. And these are not the best of times.

Of course, they aren’t the worst of times, either. Having been through the worst of times, I can categorically say that Potter’s inability to choose between me and his wife is on the Voldemort scale only a one. Once you’ve been subjected to the Voldemort scale, other scales are immaterial. The Voldemort scale has only three reference points. There is one, where you are alive. Then there is nine, where you are being repeatedly subjected to a battery of Cruciatus curses. And then there is ten; when he finally kills you. So, I really shouldn’t complain because I’m still alive, Potter’s still alive, and we are still fucking like rabbits. No, I shouldn’t complain. But I am. Because he cannot choose between me and his wife. 

Week after week he comes home from these sessions, eyes red, wan, often with the smell of Firewhiskey on his breath because he’s stopped at the Leaky in order to pull himself together before Flooing home. At some point I imagine he just won’t turn up, just won’t come home.

This place has become his home, and I really do not have an iota of insight into why. Because it was never Astoria’s home, which is as scathing a commentary on our marriage as one could possibly imagine. We’d raised a child in this house, for Circe’s sake. And Scorpius, no matter how problematic our relationship remains, still calls this place home. Yet she was merely a guest on some level. Maybe if she’d embraced the house as much as I had it would have been too much of a surrender. She had to keep some portion of her sacred and inviolate, or I would have hurt her a million times more than I unknowingly did. I understand she’s happy with Weasley. She still isn’t talking to me, and this is not a woman who holds grudges. I’d hurt her very, very badly with this Potter business. I hadn’t meant to, but then the bone-deep betrayals are often the ones you don’t intend to inflict.

This house was never Astoria’s home so much as she had visiting rights. Much like the flat was totally hers. I was allowed a dresser to house my socks and a few pairs of shorts, and a wee portion of the closet was mine so I had a place to hang my pants, a few dress shirts, and my dress robes, but that was pretty much it. Oh, and I could drink the cognac with impunity. Beyond that my rights were questionable. Same for her with Bookend, as it turned out. Once Astoria had left me, there was so little of her to leave that it was, in a way, like she’d never lived here. She put up with the country for my sake, as much as she put up with all my other annoying habits—like lusting after men’s dicks as opposed to women’s breasts. She is a city girl at heart, and it took our divorce for me to finally recognize that. Yet another check in the column that confirms that Draco Malfoy is an utter prick. Here your wife loathes living in the country and it takes you twenty-odd years to discover that fact.

And yet Potter. How does he do it? Three weeks into this bizarre relationship of ours he’d appropriated the everlasting regard and undying loyalty of the house elves. It took him a month before he had “his” stool at the local pub--which had taken me four fucking years and fronting for an innumerable number of pints. Brooms began to compete with the brollies for space in the umbrella stand. Meals gradually stopped being Italian and then became resolutely English; if there wasn’t steak and kidney pie once a week, all hell would break loose in the kitchen. In short, he took over whatever space that wasn’t absolutely stamped with my personality on it. The library remained mine because that was where I wrote my trashy novels and Potter wasn’t much of a reader, unless half of the sentences had the word “Quidditch” in them at least once. Even the garden—the garden!—my pride and joy, succumbed to his influence. The planting because less rigid, more lush and haphazard. And hence more beautiful.

That was the word I would use to describe my life with him. Beautiful. Of course, it hadn’t been “ugly” before. Despite our current emotional embargo, at one time Astoria and I had a tremendous amount of fun together. But I wouldn’t have ever called it beautiful. Maybe pretty every now and then. Of course, once one has children there is that unique beauty to your life that is your child and yours alone. But it was something similar with Potter. That if he left my world it just wouldn’t be as beautiful.

Like all Thursday nights for the last year, he returned late. Some nights he was later than others. I tried not to clock watch, but once the clocks chimed ten and he wasn’t home, I couldn’t help a growing sense of panic. But, no, tonight wasn’t the night he wouldn’t appear. The whoosh of the Floo in the library fireplace signaled his arrival. I wish I could say that I managed at least the soupcon of a smile in greeting but it was late and I was tired and I hadn’t eaten because I was waiting for him and I have blood sugar issues and turn into a raging son-of-a-bitch when I don’t eat.

“You’re late,” I muttered and kissed the top of his head, trying like hell to keep a snippy tone out of my voice and for the most part succeeding. Noting that his eyes weren’t red from crying for once, the panic eating a hole in my stomach lining eased up a bit. “Shrimp,” I whispered and gave him another kiss.

“Occupational hazard when your relatives half starve you.” This was our standard exchange and the panic receded even further. Merlin’s balls, I hope never to lay eyes on those Dursleys. I’m a reformed Death Eater, but there are some people who deserve to be tortured.

“Let’s eat in here.” At my words, our dinners appeared at the small table in the corner, flanked by two gigantic goblets filled with a delectable French burgundy. My table hote might no longer be European, but I was damned if I was going to drink substandard wine.

He ignored his food and reached directly for the wine. I followed suit. We sat there for a few minutes, pretending to eat, and then I grabbed his hand and pulled him to the couch. I plonked down on one end, him the other, and we interwove our legs and watched the fire die down while we finished our wine.

I have lots of friends in my life but I am stingy with my love. Despite appearances to the contrary, I love Astoria, I love my mother, I had loved and hated my father, I adore my son, I do love Pansy, although our friendship survives better if I don’t see her too much (she really brings out the worst in me), and I’ve become very fond of Daphne, Astoria’s sister. This friendship has died its inevitable natural death. I don’t begrudge her choosing her sister over me, but I do miss her. Blaise and I have drifted apart over the years so much so that sometimes it’s hard to conjure up what he looks like. And then Harry Potter takes over my life, and I realize that I’ve been hoarding all this love for so many years, only giving it to my son with any abandonment, and now I had stockpiles of it. Mountains of it that I was aching to give to him, and yet I still stuck with hoarding it because it was obvious that he loved his wife even as I suspected he loved me as well, and he didn’t have a fucking clue what he was going to do.

I am always determined to _not_ ask how the session had gone and yet every Thursday, I can’t help but say at some point, “So? How did it go?”

Tonight the words were on my tongue, I was fighting like hell to keep from saying anything. I even went so far as to clamp my lips tight so that not a single word would escape, when he said, “She’s given me an ultimatum.” He had never volunteered a status report on his counseling sessions before, so this was something of a bombshell.

I counted to ten and said in what I hoped was a calm voice, “What does your therapist think?”

At that he ducked his head so that I couldn’t see his face. A stress headache blossomed right above my left ear. And then began to throb. I waited and waited and waited, and finally he said, “We haven’t seen the therapist for months. It’s just been dinner on Thursday nights.”

It felt as if all my molecules stopped dividing for a split second. “Come again?” I managed to rasp out.

Still refusing to face me and staring off into the fire, he said, “The therapist basically threw up her hands. She believed that I had a right to pursue a relationship with another gay man and that our relationship—me and Ginny’s—needed to move onto a different plane. Best friends if you will. That this would be hard for the children but that they would, at some point, have to accept my sexuality.”

I couldn’t possibly be neutral on this issue, but it seemed eminently sensible advice. Not that I would have followed that advice twenty years ago.“And?”

He levitated the wine bottle over to his glass and filled it to the top. Taking a gigantic swig that would have done a giant proud, he continued to stare at the fire.

“And?” I repeated and not very nicely.

“Ginny was adamant that we could resume our marriage and I could have bits on the side. After all, I’d proven quite decidedly that I could, on the odd occasion, perform the necessary.” Harry was one of those perpetually even-tempered buggers, and the bitterness in his voice was a little shocking to hear.

“Nip off on your lunch hour every now and then to one of those skanky pubs in the heart of Knockturn Alley and get a blow in the gents when the mood suits you.”

He didn’t even bother answering, he just nodded.

“And the dinner parties?” This time I sounded snide, and he winced at the tone in my voice.

“We sit in a corner of the Leaky, I push my dinner around on my plate and she talks at me for three hours, reminding me how happy we’d been and how the children hate this separation and how could I possible fuck a Death Eater and we could have another child and the guilt just keeps piling up around me and threatening to suffocate me. At some point I start crying and she stops talking. Then I come home.”

I couldn’t say anything. All of that was true. Every single fucking bit of it. 

He turned to face me. “I’m sorry.” This is where he tells me he’s leaving for good. I took a deep breath and one hand grabbed the end of the sofa cushion, as if to anchor me. “I should have told you. That wasn’t right of me.”

I let my breath out slowly and relaxed my hand. “We agree. That _was_ rather rotten of you. So why no tears tonight? I assume trashing me was on the menu as usual. Not that she’s exactly wrong about me.”

He winnowed a hand under my pants leg and grabbed my ankle. Maybe he needed some anchoring himself.

“We skipped the usual laundry list of why I was ruining the lives of everyone around me. It was basically why let my gay ruin our childrens’ lives? Return home by next weekend or she’d ward the house against me and start divorce proceedings. She said she’s had enough.”

I’d never pegged Ginny Weasley as a dice thrower, but then these Weasleys always surprise me. I have underrated them my entire life, much to my detriment. Apparently the brother is making my ex-wife deliriously happy, which shocks me. I try not to see it as a commentary on our former marriage. Perhaps I should.

“That’s ridiculous.” I didn’t bother to hide my scorn. “You could break the wards without so much of a flick of your wand. But I suppose it’s more symbolic than anything else. Does she realize what she’s demanding?”

I had lived that life for years. Not that Astoria demanded that I sneak around and have anonymous sex with lots of men. I came up with that solution on my own. And yes, it kept us together and it allowed me to raise my son. It was very convenient. I thought I was having my cake, more or less, and eating it too. What dear Mrs. Potter didn’t realize is that how it cheats both of you. Astoria got a part-time husband and I got a part-time wife, and she filled the gaps with her bridge buddies and I filled the gap with blow jobs in men’s loo at the Cock and Bullwhip. It made sense until Scorpius grew up, when it exposed that house of cards for all of its worthless worth. I’m not sure I would have done it any differently, but I’d have liked to have known the cost in the end. Astoria and I might have salvaged our friendship. As it is now, I doubt she’ll ever speak to me again.

“Speaking as someone who could conjure up a map this very instant and mark those pubs whose customers would come in their pants at the thought of getting a hand job from Harry Potter, or, if you want to cat around in Muggle London, I can recommend those pubs or hotels that would also suit. Inevitably it becomes a little soul-destroying as a steady diet, as you found out in your fucking half of Britain days. So she’s done with your gay bad self? It can only come out to play in places like Knockturn Alley. She wants you to put it back in the hidden little closet from whence it came?” I tried to sound neutral and fair and all those things I am not. I failed miserably. I sounded like my usual snide, sarcastic self.

“Something like that,” he admitted, sighed, and went back to staring at the fire.

“What are you going to do?” I dreaded the answer but maybe it was time to finally face this. Both of us.

“Dunno,” he said in a small voice. “The kids… Just, fuck, Draco, I don’t know.” He pulled his hand away from my ankle and sat forward, his hands clutching his knees, his head bowed forward in that classic posture of utter despair.

I suppose this was better than an out-and-out, “I’ll see you around. It’s been fun.” There was that mental image again of me standing in front of a bank vault, filled with all this love and affection I’d been saving and, I might as well be honest, protecting, and it might all be for naught. I’d found the one person who seemed to have the combination to this vault, and he was about to walk away. I could spend it now, or I could continue hoarding it. Well, I’ve never been one for doing anything by halves. My younger self would have slammed that emotional vault shut with a gigantic, “Fuck you, Harry Potter.” My older self knew that you had to grab what niggardly crumbs life was going to dole out. If this was my last night with Harry in my bed, then I was going to relish it with every single fiber of my Potter-loving ass.

I swung my legs to the floor and crawled on my knees over to where he was sitting. Edging myself between his knees, I brought my hands up to his face, forcing him to look at me. 

“Listen to me. You can leave me. I’ll hate you and curse you—not literally, you understand, well, maybe one wee tiny curse—but I beg you, do not deny who you are. I’m not saying don’t go back to her. Your children, your history, all demand that. But I watched you for years, standing up to all those people who insisted that Voldemort hadn’t returned. You faced that madman by yourself when you were little more than a child. I imagine that most people think you’re fearless. I don’t believe that. I believe you were shitting in your knickers the entire time. But it didn’t matter. You faced him because it was the right thing to do. You’re a total idiot that way.”

At that he closed his eyes and his mouth, that mouth that drove me spare, began to tremble. I put my cheek against his and said in a low voice into his ear, “It doesn’t have to be me. In fact, we both know that I’m the last person in the world who you should be fucking. But don’t cheat yourself of emotional and physical intimacy with another man. I did and I paid a price. Look at me. I’m sucking the dick of my mortal enemy.” That got a wee laugh as it was meant to, but now it was time to get serious because I had to fight for him. Not for us, but for him.

“Don’t hide who you are,” I begged. Pulling back, I grabbed his chin, and shook it a little so that he would open his eyes. In the dim light from the fire even that spectacular green had shadowed into an ambiguous, muddied non-color. But I knew that color so intimately that if this very second he got up and Flooed out of here, leaving me for good, I would take the color of those eyes with me wherever I went for the rest of my life. I shook his chin again. “Does she have a right to be furious with you? Of course she does. Do your children have a right to be furious? Yes, they do. Your friends? Wondering if you’re gone absolutely bonkers because you’re in a relationship with me. Yes. Yes to all the above. I acknowledge that. But you know what? Your wife can just fucking go to hell as far as I am concerned. Be her best friend. Have dinner on Thursday nights. Spend the holidays together, but don’t deny who you are and what you need. You did it for years, even if you were too much of an idiot to know that you were a flaming homo. But you know now. That closet door is open, lover. Trust me. I wrote the book on blow jobs in pubs on my lunch hour. Literally. Once it’s open, once you have that knowledge, you can’t close it. It would be wrong, Harry. The wrong thing to do.” Now it was time to close my eyes, because Christ on a cracker, you can only take so much. “And you don’t do the wrong thing. That’s not who you are. You don’t have to be gay with me, but you have to be gay with yourself.”

The words were barely out of my mouth, the “fff” leaving my lips when he crushed his mouth against mine. It wasn’t a kiss so much this enormous press. Then with that sneaky strength he had, belied by that slender torso and slim hips, he hauled me up by the armpits and somehow maneuvered me in such a way that all of a sudden I was on the sofa, underneath him, and he was ripping off my clothes in the most violent and delicious way. I didn’t hold anything back. It was as if I were shouting, “Here. All yours. Draco buffet. Eat me.” And he did. God, I had bruises for days. I just arched my back and gave it all up and then some. It wasn’t sex, although that would have so much wiser.

I am not a giver by nature. A selfish person who’d for much of his life had used his smarts and intelligence to get what he wanted, and then Voldemort stood that notion on my pointy little chin. But even that wasn’t enough of a lesson. It took my son basically telling me to fuck off, you Death Eater you, that truly humbled me. I was still something of a son-of-a-bitch. A leopard doesn’t change all his spots, but this, I believe, is why Harry Potter has such power over me. He always expects more of me and I can’t help but meet his expectations. I am my better self around him. No one brings this out in me. Not even my mother.

And here I am with him, my emotional bank vault open, his for the taking. Literally, we were both crying as we sobbed out our orgasms, my nails gouging into the flesh of his beautiful arse, pulling him closer and closer, even though he couldn’t possibly be any closer short of us sharing a kidney. That had never happened to me, crying during sex. But then it wasn’t really sex. It was love, not something I was very good at.

You really have nothing to say after something like that. At least I was without words, a completely novel state of affairs, I assure you. I Apparated us to our bedroom. Accioing a flannel, I wiped the tears from his face first and then mine. He spooned me like normal because he is a possessive bastard—one of the few traits we have in common—and I fell asleep as his silent tears fell on my shoulder blade.

I wasn’t surprised to find him gone in the morning. His side of the bed was cold. I had a moment of blind rage at the thought that he had hexed me into some sort of coma so that he could leave undetected, but perhaps it was best. 

I didn’t bother to have breakfast, not even a cup of tea. I headed out to the garden and began pruning and weeding and whatever I could do to keep my hands and mind busy, because a breakdown of unbelievable proportions was hovering, just waiting until I lowered my defenses. It was attack the blackberries or go completely mental. I hacked at the blackberry bushes for hours until I couldn’t even lift the shears one more time. Stumbling into the house, covered in grime, leaves, and sweat, I was just in time to see Scorpius and Charlie Weasley Floo into the library, their arms around the waist of and supporting a very, very drunk Harry Potter.

“Drawco, Drawco,” Harry shouted. He was so drunk that my eyes smarted from the invisible clouds of eighty proof fumes emanating from his breath.

“Potter,” I said in a neutral tone.

“Wen to see Schopius and Charlie. Love ‘em. Do you love ‘em? I do.” Harry was such a happy drunk. He narrowed his eyes. “Did you hack back those bussshes? Bad Dwaco. Should have waited. Help you. Nashty. Oh, your hans.”

He wrenched himself away from Scorpius and Charlie and didn’t so much as walk as fall in my direction. Grabbing my hands, which despite my gloves were covered in welts from the blackberry thorns, he brought them up to his mouth and began kissing them. He kept kissing and then saying, “Be’er?” and then kissing them again over and over again. I heard Charlie Weasley mutter, “Stupefy.” Mid-kiss he fell on me, which was then punctuated by a snore.

“I’ll take him up upstairs,” said Scorpius and began levitating Harry out of my arms and up and out of library.

“Our bedroom,” I shouted at him as Scorpius and Harry exited the room. “I mean, my bedroom. You know what I mean.”

Scorpius waved a hand at me without looking back. Of course he knew what I meant.

A quick once over with my wand and I more or less banished the leaves and sweat. I desperately needed a drink.

“Although this seems eminently obscene in light of what just transpired, I very much would like a drink. A pint or something harder?” I knew from that sojourn in New Zealand that Weasley was primarily a Black and Tan drinker but rarely said no to decent Firewhiskey.

“Wouldn’t turn down something with a little kick in it,” he grunted out. “It’s been a clusterfuck, mate. A right clusterfuck.”

“Sorry about that. Can’t say it’s been a picnic for me either. Have a seat. Were you up with him most of the night. Or is that day in your neck of the woods?” I motioned to the sofa in front of the fire and joined him. Snapping my fingers, the major domo of our house elves appeared. “Two Firewhiskeys, please, Sneeples. Fill them up to the top, if you will.” Normally, I’d have poured them myself, but my hands were shaking so badly that I doubted I’d be able to pour the drinks without spilling half of the bottle on the sideboard. “Thank you, Sneeples. Would you see if Master Scorpius needs any help with Mr. Harry? They should be in the blue room by now. Cheers,” I said and raised my glass to the pop of Sneeples Apparating out of the room.

“Day _and_ night. It’s about four a.m. our time about now.” I noticed he said “our” time. He and Scorpius had reached that point. Just like I said “our” bedroom. Your frame of reference becomes inclusive, not exclusive. “You’ve given your elves clothes?”

“It takes a couple of decades, but I usually learn from my mistakes. Eventually.”

“You know, there might come a day when I actually like you. Cheers.”

We drank for a couple of minutes in silence. I suppose I should be asking questions but I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answers.

“Not like I don’t have enough beds. You and Scorpius want to catch a few winks before you head back?”

He took a big swallow. “Can’t. Need to set my sister straight on a few things.”

“I didn’t ask him to choose, Weasley. I told him that it wasn’t a choice between me and your sister. It was a choice between her and himself.”

“Yeah, I heard.” He gave me the once over, like he was trying to figure out if I were animal, mineral, or vegetable. I’d been scrutinized by others my entire life. First because I was rich and privileged and snotty as all get out, and then because I was rich and privileged and phenomenally stupid. I didn’t flinch. “Told me about your big speech. Pretty stand up. Like I said, one day I might actually like you.”

“Don’t sprain an eyebrow or anything.” By this time the booze had worked miracles. I was still a nervous wreck, but I didn’t care as much about being a wreck. “Another?” I stood up and held up my glass.

“Naw, will splinch myself. Just so you know, he came to me because he wanted someone, just one bleeping person, to understand why he wasn’t going back to her. Me being gay and all that. Thought maybe I could explain it to her, because he’d obviously done a piss poor job of it over the last few months. And, truth be told, fucking a Malfoy and all that. Thought I’d have insight into that as well.”

I couldn’t help it. I let out a tortured grunt of relief and fell back into my chair. Thank Merlin’s dick. He was coming back. For now.

“My son is a much better person than I am. You’d be a fool not to snap him up,” I pointed out.

“Don’t see me letting him out of my clutches anytime soon or ever, if you want to know. In fact…” Weasley began blushing. “We’ve been thinking about getting married in the New Year. I’m old-fashioned that way.”

I thought about that for a second, and surprisingly I didn’t mind at all. Scorpius was far too young to be married, but this man loved him. That I knew. If there were little twinges that Scorpius might be marrying a father figure who didn’t have all the baggage that I was lugging around and would continue to haul around my entire life, well, it was only a twinge.

“You don’t need my blessing, but you have it. Congratulations.” I raised my empty glass to toast them both.

“No, we don’t, but I’ll take it.” He got up and made for the fireplace. “Ginny’s not going to like what I’m going to tell her, but then there isn’t any way here for her to get what she wants. Which is her life two years ago.”

I needed another drink, because, really, this was far too much emotional for one conversation, but I didn’t have the energy to haul myself up out of my chair. I Accioed the decanter and poured myself a small snort. I needed a little more Dutch courage.

“You might not believe this, but I _do_ feel sorry for her. I’ve lost that as well, and it’s irreplaceable. I would never change my life now for my life with Astoria, with or without Harry. There is a refreshing truthfulness to every day. Still, I miss our camaraderie, being joint parents, and, more importantly, sharing a history that I don’t share with anyone one else. It’s sad, so, yes, I know why she’s clutching onto their history with both hands, unwilling to let go. But,” I swilled back a gigantic mouthful because this was the part that was going to be a righteous bitch to say, “there are lots of gay men in this world. He might not stay with me.”

Again, Weasley, gave me that once over. Unless I was mistaken, and I rarely am, he just sprained an eyebrow. “True, but you seem to have accepted him for who he is. He doesn’t have many people who just accept him as Harry. Pretty much his curse. Plus, as I’ve heard about sixteen times last night, you’re a flipping god at sucking dick, so I don’t think you have much to worry about.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Yes, there’s that,” I said with _very_ false modesty.

“Family trait. Ah, Scorp. I’m off to Ginny’s. See you back at compound?”

“Yes, those eggs are about to hatch,” said Scorpius as he entered the room. “I don’t trust that idiot Graves. He wouldn’t know a dragon egg from a daffodil. Don’t be long, you look done in. What family trait?”

“Blue eyes,” Weasley said with a saucy little smile. “Might be a while, so get some shut eye if you can. Unfortunately the two kids in the family who inherited Mum’s temper are me and Ginny. Will be home as soon as I yell some sense into her.” With that he gave Scorpius a quick kiss on the mouth and was gone.

“You were a while. Is he okay?”

“Well, _now_ he is.” Scorpius rolled his eyes, and for one very brief second he looked like his mother. I did miss her. “Got him upstairs and thought I’d better un-Stupefy him. As soon as I did, he began vomiting up all the booze.”

Ugh. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

“We did make it to the loo just in time, but I had to throw him in the shower. He’s back asleep. Sneeples is with him. I didn’t think he should be alone. I made up some Hangover Potion as well. He’s going to need it.”

Scorpius was such a nice, thoughtful young man. How did I raise such a nice child? I wasn’t a nice person, so how did this happen?

“Thank you. I hear congratulations are in order.” I held out my hand.

He didn’t blush. In fact, a self-satisfied grin stretched from ear to ear. “Yeah, Charlie’s sort of an old-fashioned fellow at heart. And it turns out that I am, too. I’m going to tell Mother and Grandmama in a couple of days, so don’t spoil the surprise,” he admonished.

It was so funny. The world was so large and yet all of us—the Weasleys, Potters, and Malfoys—just keep circling around each other. Even the future generations were staying in our orbit. I couldn’t possibly spoil the surprise because it would mean that Astoria and I would actually be talking to each other. But I didn’t need to involve Scorpius in all that.

“My lips are sealed. Off with you. You look tired.” I gave him a hug and actually received one in return that felt genuine. Slowly we were mending. We might never repair our relationship completely, but it was a start. I’ve learned the true value of not looking gift horses in the mouth. A very impatient man at heart had finally learned patience.

I could have Apparated upstairs but I decided to take the stairs, slowly, and think a little about me and Harry. I hadn’t truly won, not really. I had said that this was between him and his wife, not me and Ginny, and I truly believed that. He leaving her once and for all didn’t mean that I had “won.” It just meant that he wasn’t willing to live a lie with his wife. Gryffindor.

I could hear him snoring even before I entered the room. Like he said, Scorpius had lined up little vials of Hangover Potion on the bedside table. I undressed and scooted under the covers. Spooning him first and then placing my hand on his heart second, I listened to him breathe in and out, felt his heart beating against the palm of my hand. Burrowing my nose in the damp of his hair, I inhaled the scent of shampoo. His hand covered mine, squeezed it, and then he went back to sleep. No, I think we all agree that I don’t deserve him, but I am a tenacious bastard. As I said, there are many, many gay men in this world. But I intend to fight like hell for him. Plus, well, I suck dick like a god.

_Fin_


End file.
